Vichy France

Vichy France was a fascist regime that ruled over southern France from the city of Vichy from 22 June 1940 to 11 November 1942 during World War II. Premier Marshal Philippe Petain signed an armistice with Nazi Germany in 1940 shortly after the Wehrmacht invaded France, and the Germans proceeded to give Petain full powers on 10 July 1940 as a puppet dictator. The Germans controlled northern France, while southern France was ruled by the Vichy regime. France adopted the idea of "National Revolution", forcing women to focus on motherhood and not employment and empowering conservative Catholics. Paris was no longer a center of art and culture due to the decline in liberty under the Vichy regime, whose state-run media ran campaigns of anti-Semitism and anti-communism, deporting Jews, communists, and other "undesirables" to German concentration camps. On 11 Noveber 1942, German troops occupied the rest of Vichy France after its admiral Francois Darlan negotiated an armistice with the Western Allies after Operation Torch, ending Vichy France's sovereignty. It continued to be a puppet regime until 1944, when the Allies invaded France and ended the Axis Powers' occupation.